VANCOUVER, British Columbia, March 25 (UPI) -- The Canadian government has ordered the slaughter of 300,000 chickens and turkeys in southern British Columbia to contain an outbreak of avian flu.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency had already ordered the slaughter of about 90,000 birds in the Fraser Valley area, but the strain of bird flu has continued to hit farm after farm, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. said Thursday.
The latest cull affects 21 farms. Some 16,000 chickens were destroyed at a British Columbia poultry farm in mid-February when the first strain of avian flu surfaced.
Chief provincial veterinarian Ron Lewis said while the number sounds high, the loss-risk factor is low.
"Relative to the total population in the Fraser Valley, it's only 1 or 2 percent of the total number of birds out there," Lewis said.
